Centennial Cantata Is Sunday
This year marks the centennial performance of the Community Christmas Cantata.
On Sunday, Dec. 8, at 4 p.m. and 7 p.m., in the sanctuary of the Monticello Presbyterian Church, more than 60 vocalists and musicians from Monticello Presbyterian, Monticello Baptist, Monticello First Methodist, New Rocky Creek Baptist, Lighthouse Mennonite, and others will join director Lisa Kelly, accompanist Kathy Sanvidge, and narrator Rev. Corey Ingold.
Everyone is welcome to attend. Seating is limited, but livestreaming and overflow seating will be available in the Fellowship Hall.
The first annual Community Christmas Cantata was held in 1924 when the choirs of Monticello Baptist, Methodist, and Presbyterian Churches came together to perform Christmas music, according to John Harvey in The History of Jasper County, Georgia. Mr. Harvey reports that during 1943 and 1944, at the height of World War II, when many of the choir members were away serving in the military, a program of Christmas carols was performed by three local church organists on the Sunday evening before Christmas.
Linda Jordan, who has participated in the past 58 consecutive Christmas cantatas and has saved the program from nearly all of them, shared several stories about the event over the years. She first played piano for the combined choir from the Monticello Baptist, Methodist, and Presbyterian Churches in 1966, the last year the Community Cantata was held in the old Baptist Church, which at that time was “propped up on boulders” or on “telephone poles,” depending on who you ask.
The Cantata alternated every year between the Baptist and Methodist Churches for the first five or six decades, as the Presbyterian Church had no regular music director. In turn, the Presbyterian Church hosted the annual Community Thanksgiving Service and has continued to do so every year since its inception.
In 1979 Bob Dean, Piedmont Academy’s music director at the time, conducted the Cantata choir at the Baptist Church on behalf of the Presbyterians, who first officially hosted the 1982 Cantata in their church sanctuary when the three churches began taking turns hosting the annual service. Many familiar names have directed over the years, though often a music teacher from a local school would direct.
In 1988 a young teacher named Lisa Rakes directed her first Cantata. Lisa Rakes Kelly is directing for the 13th time this year.
In 1978, Faith Bradley began the Presbyterian Bell Choir, which has been a traditional part of the Cantata programs since then. In the 1970s, a teenaged Patricia “Trisha” Yearwood was often among the Cantata choir singers. Director Lisa Kelly reached out to Trisha to invite her to participate this year, but unfortunately she had prior commitments. Several members of the 2024 Cantata choir have been singing in it over the past seven decades.
The difficult days of pandemic social distancing seem far away now, but in December of 2020 each choir recorded their own parts for the cantata separately. The recordings were then all combined and streamed by the Baptist Church.
Our community has found many creative ways over the decades of persisting in celebrating the story of the birth of Jesus through music. Perhaps in 2124 Monticelloans will be gathering to celebrate the Bicentennial of the Community Christmas Cantata!
